USQ Online Journalism: #3 What constitutes a credible source?

When I was asked to write about “What constitutes a credible source” as part of my Online Journalism assignment it got me thinking. So far, I filter and self-judge whether a source or website is credible half using my common sense and half using my common sense. But then again, sometimes there are websites out there that have made their “Advertising” so realistic that it comes off to the majority of audience as Real Life News. Take for example, this Acai Berry Advertisement.

 *click picture for website*

An example of false advertising in news representation of Acai Berry

Many people have the mentality that because “published on the net, then it must be true!”. However, we must accept that unlike news magazine or news paper where the news have been filtered and edited by highly trained editors and journalist, the world wide web gives everyone the chance (unfortunately) to publish whatever opinions or news that BENEFITS them. Hence, it prompted me to do some in-depth research on several websites for insights on how to identify credible sources so that I would have the knowledge to identify what’s real and what’s not.

The common factors in identifying credible sources (especially specialist information like medicine and technology) are as below:-

Check the domain name & Identify the purpose this domain site has for publishing information on the Internet 

If the information is linked to an organization, try to determine the reliability of the sponsoring organization. One tip is the url ending. If the site name ends with .edu, it is most likely an educational institution. Even so, you should be aware of political bias. 

If a site ends in .gov, it is most likely a reliable government web site. Government sites are usually good sources for statistics and objective reports.

However, .gov and .edu names still remain constant in identifying the kind of site. When you see .edu you know that this is an educational institution while the following sites are published by governments: .gov is United States government, .ca is Canadian government, .jp is Japanese government, etc. 

 Sites that end in .org are usually non-profit organizations. They can be very good sources or very poor sources, so you'll have to take care to research their possible agendas or political biases, if they exist. 

There are several ways that you can discover their purpose for hosting this information.

 If the site is a .com, usually their purpose is to generate revenue in some way. Determine how they are trying to do this.

If the site is .org, .com, or .net, read the information that describes who they are and why they are publishing this information.

If the site is .org, .com, or .net, find out if they are being sponsored by other reputable organizations.

If the site is governmental or educational (.gov or .edu) be sure that they have clearly identified who they are.

 Determine who authored this information

Sometimes information does not need to include who authored the information, but at times it does. In most cases, you should stay away from Internet information that doesn't list an author. While the information you find may be true, it is more difficult to validate information if you don't know the credentials of the author.

If the author is named, you will want to find his/her web page to:

• Is the author stated with their email address?
• What qualifications does this author have for publishing this information?

Verify educational credits 

Discover if the writer is either published in a scholarly journal or verify that the writer is employed by a research institution or university

 

• Does the site provide information about who compiled the site (the organization or individual)?
• Are details provided on who sponsors the site e.g. in the ’About us’ section?
• Does the organization provide an address / or other contact details? to gauge whether there are Bias information
• Is there any evidence that the author of the Web information has some authority in the field about which she or he is providing information? What are the author's qualifications, credentials and connections to the subject?
• With what organization or institution is the author associated? Is there a link to the sponsoring organization, a contact number and/or address or e-mail contact? A link to an association does not necessarily mean that the organization approved the content.
• Does the author have publications in peer reviewed (scholarly and professional) publications, on the Web or in hard copy? (If an author does not have peer reviewed articles published, this does not mean that she or he does not have credible information, only that there has been no professional "test" of the author's authority on that subject.)
• Are there clues that the author/s are biased? For example, is he/she selling or promoting a product? Is the author taking a personal stand on a social/political issue or is the author being objective ? Bias is not necessarily "bad," but the connections should be clear.

Determine if content is fact or opinion

 Online Journals and Magazines

• A reputable journal or magazine should contain a bibliography for every article. The list of sources within that bibliography should be pretty extensive, and it should include scholarly, non-Internet sources.
• Check for statistics and data within the article to back up the claims made by the author. Does the writer provide evidence to back up his statements?

  News Sources

Every television and print news source has a web site. To some extent, you can rely on the most trusted news sources, but you should not rely on them exclusively. After all, network and cable news stations are involved in entertainment. Think of them as a stepping stone to more reliable sources. 

Some of the steps that you can take to determine whether or not the content is fact or opinion are:

• Does the content cite annotated resource links that were used when creating this information?
• Does the content have limited advertising and the domain clearly states the reasons for presenting this information?
• Does this resource include the name of the institution or organization hosting or funding this information?
• Does the information have a complete list of works cited, which reference credible, authoritative sources? If the information is not backed up with sources, what is the author's relationship to the subject to be able to give an "expert" opinion?
• Can the subject you are researching be fully covered with WWW sources or should print sources provide balance? Much scholarly research is still only available in traditional print form. It is safe to assume that if you have limited background in a topic and have a limited amount of time to do your research, you may not be able to get the most representative material on the subject. So be wary of making unsupportable conclusions based on a narrow range of sources.

Check how current is the information

If the content is great, but it hasn't been updated or links are not working, a journalist should probably search for more current information on their topic. A list of questions below will also be useful in determining how recent are the information.

• Does it state when this resource was created?
• Does it state when this resource was last updated?
• Have the links been checked recently?

 References

• Is the Information developed and published by a credible source?, Payton Educational Consulting, www.tammypayton.net Criteria to Evaluate the Credibility of WWW Resources, August 1998, http://mason.gmu.edu/~montecin/web-eval-sites.htm,
• How to Evaluate a Website - Basic Evaluation Checklist, Wendy Boswell,http://websearch.about.com/od/referencesearch/a/evaluatesource_2.htm
• Evaluating Internet Research Sources, the website of Robert Harris, writer and educator, November 22, 2010www.virtualsalt.com,
• Identifying Accurate Internet Resources for Nutrition, Food Safety, and Health Demonstrations, Amy Simonne and Linda B. Bobroff, www.edis.ifas.ufl.edu
• Health information: finding reliable sources on the internet, 9 October 2010, British Medical Association, www.bma.org.uk.